The tension: The Hebrew Bible repeatedly narrates theophanies in which God is seen face-to-face — by Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, seventy elders, Manoah, Micaiah, Job, Isa…
The tension: A wide set of passages (Gen 14:19, 22; Exod 9:29; 19:5; Deut 10:14; Ps 24:1; 50:12; 89:11; 1 Cor 10:26) affirm that God owns the earth absolutely.
The tension: The Bible gives three different answers to how long Israel was in Egypt: 400 years in Genesis 15:13 and Acts 7:6, four generations in Genesis 15:16, and 430 ye…
The tension: Genesis 15:16 promises Abraham's descendants will return to Canaan "in the fourth generation." But when you actually trace the genealogy Genesis and Exodus giv…
The tension: The Decalogue and its echoes across the Torah, Gospels, and Epistles absolutize the prohibition on stealing, yet Genesis 31:19 reports without condemnation tha…
The tension: The Decalogue and a long chorus of prophetic, wisdom, and epistolary texts prohibit lying absolutely — false witness, false reports, deception are abominations.
The tension: Exodus 4:10 has Moses himself telling YHWH he is not eloquent and is "slow of speech, and of a slow tongue" — the whole reason Aaron gets attached to the missi…
The tension: Exodus 9:3-6 (the fifth plague, the murrain — the question's "sixth" is wrong) says "all the cattle of Egypt died." Three verses later at Exodus 9:19, God is w…
The tension: Exodus 32:19-28 has Moses kill 3,000 Israelites after catching them dancing around the golden calf, treating the dancing as part of the capital offense.
The tension: Exodus 17:1-7 locates the water-from-rock miracle at Rephidim in the wilderness of Sin ("the rock in Horeb"), with Moses naming the place Massah and Meribah.
